In Stats: The Failure of Indian Fast Bowlers to Step Up Overseas

• Statistician Arun Gopalakrishnan cracks down the problem behind the consistent failures of the Indian team overseas.
• India has scored in excess of 300 batting first on as many as 58 occasions. In these 58 matches, the Indian bowlers have struggled to defend the target on as many as 11 occasions.
  
• In matches post the 2015 World Cup, among all the teams who’ve played ODIs, the Indian quicks have the second-poorest economy rate – 6.12.
  

In the first ODI at Brisbane on Friday, MS Dhoni won the toss and opted to bat, his batsmen put the Australian bowlers to the sword and helped the team to a total in excess of 300. But alas, the bowlers struggled to contain the Australian batsmen, and India suffered yet another defeat.

Since the turn of the century, India has scored in excess of 300 batting first on as many as 58 occasions. In these 58 matches, the Indian bowlers have struggled to defend the target on as many as 11 occasions; the team lost outright on 10 occasions (the latest being Friday), and on one other occasion the team chasing – which was England in the 2011 World Cup – levelled the score to ensure a tie. With Friday’s 7-wicket defeat, India now have more defeats than any other team in this century despite posting in excess of 300 batting first.

The Indian captain MS Dhoni and the team director Ravi Shastri must be extremely worried by the failure of the bowlers to defend 300-plus totals. So what ails the Indian team?

In international cricket, especially in matches outside the sub-continent, the quick bowlers are the chief weapon in the captain’s armoury. And if the quicks don’t fire, there is little else the captain can do or little else the captain can go to. The failure of the Indian quicks in recent times is hurting MS Dhoni; the Indian quicks have struggled on two counts in recent times – they have struggled to dismiss opposition batsmen and have failed to keep a check on the flow of runs.

In matches post the 2015 World Cup, among all the teams who’ve played ODIs, the Indian quicks have the second-poorest economy rate – 6.12 (only the West Indies quicks have a poorer economy rate, though they’ve played only 3 ODIs in this period).

In terms of the ability to strike too, the Indian quicks fare modestly at best. In the 13 ODIs post the World Cup 2015, the Indian quicks combined have picked up only 44 wickets – that’s an average of 3 wickets per game, which is very similar to the returns in the two ODIs so far in Australia.

The strike bowlers in other teams – Mitchell Starc (1.97 wickets per match), Trent Boult (1.75 wickets per match), Morne Morkel (1.71 wickets per match ), Mustafizir Rahman (2.89 wickets per match), Lasith Malinga (1.52 wickets per match), to name a few - average nearly two wickets an ODI.

Why, even India’s Mohammed Shami picks up a wicket every 27 balls. Now, what would MS Dhoni do to have a strike bowler, an enforcer, in his team, someone who could run through sides on his own?

Ishant Sharma has been in terrific form, especially in Test cricket, in recent times. Here’s hoping he can discover that form while bowling with the white ball and be the enforcer that MS Dhoni desperately needs in his ranks.